Wrestlemasters – An Ongoing Shamoozal Project

Usually when I work on a new animated short I tend to keep very quiet about it. I generally like to keep those kinds of things close to the chest. After all, how can I surprise anyone with cool content if they know everything that’s going to be in it? With my next project, I’d like to be a little more open.

What I’m creating is something wholly original and in my mind, like nothing I’ve made before. As of this writing it is being referred to as Wrestlemasters, a name which may or may not be final. Anyway, I’m done with parody videos. I had a good run with Read Only Memory all those years ago now and the 1980s Anime videos literally sucked the life from me, even if I do think some of them had some good ideas thrown in there. It has been a full year since I’ve animated a video, and I suspect it might be another full year until anyone sees an animated video from me again.

This is kind of why I’ve decided to share more information on this project as I work on it. I’ve already been sharing lots of character designs on Twitter (also attached to this post), and I have every intention of sharing more and more information as I develop this short. I really want to get this short right. I want to make something I’m proud of and to challenge myself in a way I haven’t since I wrapped up Link’s Triumph several years ago. This is going to be a long process and I’d like for it to take as long as it’s going to take. I want to push everything I know during the creation of this. I plan on making actually good storyboards (I usually make scribbles). I want to make some slick animation. I want to have backgrounds I’m proud of. Really, I want to show that I’ve matured as an artist. This is my proving ground.

Hopefully sharing these assets will add an element of world building to this short, along with showing the design process behind it. Wrestlemasters, as of now, is a one off, but is being built with the idea of expanding beyond if it is successful.

I’ve given myself a deadline of one full year though it could take longer. I want to sit down and set some benchmarks to hit that will ensure I get as close as I can to making something really great within this year. I hope you enjoy seeing the process and please wish me luck. It’s going to be a hell of a long road.